A North Island First Nations forestry company is taking legal action to end the strike by the United Steelworkers union on the north Island, claiming it is bargaining in bad faith by insisting the company requires future contractors, including Indigenous-owned ones, to tell employees they must join the union.
La-kwa sa muqw Forestry (LKSM) is seeking a ruling that the strike is illegal. It maintains the union can attempt to bargain for expanding the bargaining unit, but it cannot force a strike over the issue.
"LKSM is not insisting that future Indigenous contractors be non-union, rather, that employees should have a choice, especially when working on their own lands, of if and how to organize themselves," says LKSM in a Sept. 17 media release.
On June 6, 105 United Steelworkers forestry workers walked off the job after a 93 per cent vote in favour of the action in late March. After several bargaining sessions with the company, the union said LKSM refused to remove concessions during negotiations, leaving members no choice but to strike.
The most contentious issue is over what the union described as LKSM's demand to hire non-union contractors for work currently done by USW members on site. The union said this includes work performed by both USW members working directly for LKSM and USW members working for contractors.
LKSM wants Indigenous contractors to retain the right to decide whether to join the union voluntarily, something it says is an essential principle held by its First Nations shareholders: the We Wai Kai, Wei Wai Kum, K’ómoks and Tlowitsis First Nations.
“That principle is fully aligned with both the 2019 Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples Act and the right to self-determination for Indigenous peoples in Canada,” said Dallas Smith, Na̲nwak̲olas president.
The First Nations are all members of the Na̲nwak̲olas Council, which acquired a 34 per cent interest in the company from Western Forest Products in a newly formed limited partnership for $35.9 million in April 2024.
LKSM applied twice to the B.C. Labour Relations Board to appoint a mediator, but in both cases the USW refused to agree to mediation, and the board exercised its discretion to decline the requests. Two requests to the B.C. Minister of Labour to appoint a special mediator have been turned down.
“The First Nations believe the appointment of a mediator would have resulted in neutral, helpful recommendations to help bring closure to the strike quickly and productively so everyone can go back to work and move forward,” Smith said.
“We are confident that, once this barrier is removed, the remaining differences can be resolved swiftly and fairly,” said Greg DeMille, operations manager with LKSM. “Our goal remains to achieve an agreement that honours both workers’ rights and the inherent rights of First Nations as partners.”
Brian Butler, the union president, has said the members believe if they do not fight LKSM's concessions, this will spread to other workplaces.
"These UW members, like the USW members that struck and won against massive (Western Forest Products) concessions in 2019/20, are fighting for all of us," Butler said in a June press release.
The Mirror contacted United Steelworkers third vice-president Jason Cox for a comment, but did not hear back before publication.
